Mental health advocates: N.H. facing access crisis

Saturday

Feb 9, 2013 at 3:15 AM

HOLLY RAMERAssociated Press

CONCORD (AP) — New Hampshire residents seeking help with personal mental health emergencies have become engulfed in the much larger crisis of access to critical treatment, advocates and medical providers said Monday.

Emergency rooms are filling up with patients waiting for beds to open up at the state psychiatric hospital, and many patients wait for days or even a week. On Monday morning alone, there were 31 adults and five children in emergency departments around the state waiting for admission, said Kenneth Norton, executive director of New Hampshire chapter of the National Alliance on Mental Illness. Two adults at Concord Hospital had been waiting for four days, and a teenager had been waiting for two.

"We do not categorically delay essential treatment for cancer, heart disease, stroke or any other life threatening medical illness," he said. "And while it is morally wrong to do this to any person, it is unconscionable to do this to our children."

Norton was joined by representatives from more than a dozen other groups, including the New Hampshire Hospital Association, New Hampshire Medical Society, community mental health centers and law enforcement. Participants said the growing problem not only endangers those with mental illness but hospital staff and other emergency room patients.

On Wednesday, for example, nearly half of the 27 beds at Elliot Hospital in Manchester were taken by psychiatric patients, leaving patients with chest pain, head injuries and broken bones stranded in the waiting room, said Dr. John Seidner, president of the New Hampshire chapter of the American College of Emergency Physicians.

Dr. Jeffrey Fetter, president of the New Hampshire Psychiatric Society, said days spent idle in an emergency room represent wasted opportunities to prevent suicide, assault and suffering. Someone in the midst of a psychiatric crisis needs to be surrounded by safety, not chaos, he said. "We've all been there — flashing lights, alarms, staff rushing urgently to stabilize a crash victim. These rooms were designed for patients suffering from heart attacks, not hallucinations," he said.

Monday's news conference followed last month's announcement by the state Department of Health and Human Services of a new plan to reduce the wait time for inpatient psychiatric care. That plan includes reopening 12 of the 60 beds that have been closed at the state hospital due to budget cuts in recent years, improved tracking of individuals waiting for beds, using state hospital staff as consultants in emergency rooms and providing better follow-up after patients are discharged from the state hospital to reduce readmissions.

The department also plans to seek additional funding for community-based services, which participants at the news conference said would do more to solve the problem than adding state hospital beds.

"We need more support, and we need more resources to get the job done in the community," said Louis Josephson, CEO of Riverbend Community Mental Health Center.

The state is about halfway into a 10-year plan to improve mental health services, but Josephson and other advocates argue little has been accomplished so far. And the state still faces a lawsuit filed on behalf of individuals with mental illness accusing it of needlessly confining disabled residents in mental wards because it lacks services to treat them in the community.

Gov. Maggie Hassan met with Norton on Friday, a day after she took office. He said he was encouraged by the meeting but it remains unclear whether she and the Legislature will boost funding for mental health.

Hassan said Monday that she considers the mental health system a pressing challenge.

"We must take steps to improve access to mental health services and help those desperately in need of care," she said. "Over the coming weeks, I will be bringing people together to make the difficult, fiscally responsible decisions needed to balance our budget while protecting New Hampshire's priorities, including providing high quality health services."